Diana Wallis Taylor

Diana Wallis Taylor wrote historical biblical fiction that imagines the lives surrounding brief scriptural accounts. Journey to the Well develops the story of the Samaritan woman who meets Jesus at Jacob’s well, giving her the name Marah and placing her within the customs, family pressures, and physical landscape of first-century Samaria. Xulon Press issued an earlier 316-page edition in 2003. Revell later published a revised 336-page edition in 2009 under the fuller form Journey to the Well: A Novel. Taylor’s narrative follows Marah through arranged marriage, loss, social isolation, and the encounter that reframes her future. The book draws its central event from the Gospel of John while inventing a plausible personal history around a figure whose earlier life the biblical account leaves unstated. Taylor continued this approach in novels about Martha, Mary Magdalene, Claudia, Ruth, and other women of the ancient world. Her work combines research into daily life and religious practice with character-centered retellings designed for readers of Christian fiction.